Managing starvation: Israel’s Gaza aid shift under global scrutiny

Israel’s sudden policy reversal over the weekend — announcing daily 'tactical pauses' in military operations and conducting its first-ever airdrop of aid into Gaza — reveals just how severe the humanitarian crisis has become and how forceful the international backlash now is.

While IDF spokespeople appeared in the media denying the existence of famine in Gaza, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu authorised a dramatic shift: permitting airdropped food and agreeing to pause military activity to allow UN aid convoys to move through designated corridors.

“These decisions were made hastily and in a state of panic,” wrote military analyst Amos Harel in Haaretz, noting that Netanyahu bypassed his far-right coalition allies.

More than four months after breaking a ceasefire with Hamas and resuming the war, Israel finds itself at a dead end. The military campaign has yielded neither a decisive victory nor the release of the hostages — while Hamas’s leverage may, paradoxically, have grown, Harel notes.

Back in March, analysts warned the renewed military push was unlikely to alter the war’s trajectory. Weeks of reporting have since documented the scale of destruction, death toll, and abject failure of international mechanisms, like the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, to deliver food at scale.

As conditions deteriorate further, Israel’s late-stage humanitarian overtures are being met with growing scepticism both inside Gaza and abroad.

In response to mounting pressure and horrifying images of starving civilians, Israel announced a daily "tactical humanitarian pause" in three coastal areas — Al-Mawasi, Deir al-Balah, and parts of Gaza City. The pause is set to last ten hours daily, from 10am to 8pm, and is designed to facilitate a safe passage for humanitarian convoys via designated routes.

To support the pause, the IDF said it had reopened a key power line to a desalination plant, boosting water output tenfold. Additionally, Israel, Jordan and the UAE conducted a joint airdrop of 28 aid packages. But the effectiveness of such operations remains in question. UNICEF’s Joe English told CNN that airdrops — while used globally — are inefficient and risky in densely populated areas like Gaza.

Humanitarian organisations warn that these steps are too little, too late. Officials in Gaza report continued deaths from malnutrition and chaos around aid distribution points, where desperate civilians gather in the absence of co-ordinated supply systems.

Hamas condemned the measures as cosmetic. “The occupation’s plan... manages starvation, it doesn’t end it,” the group declared.

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, sidelined in the decision-making process, denounced the aid policy entirely and called for a full conquest of Gaza and a halt to all humanitarian efforts. The Hostages Families Forum, meanwhile, said the humanitarian pauses must be part of a broader hostage release agreement, warning that limited deals have failed to bring results. “This is what the failure of the partial deals strategy looks like,” it said.

Despite the tactical pause, the reality on the ground remains dire. Thousands of trucks carrying food and medicine are backed up at the Kerem Shalom crossing, Gaza’s main entry point for aid. Another crossing at Zikim operates in the north, but neither can meet the overwhelming need.

On Sunday, just over 100 trucks entered Gaza. Tom Fletcher, head of the UN’s humanitarian coordination office, said “sustained action” is required. The World Food Programme welcomed the pause but stressed that far more aid is required to reach Gaza’s 2.1 million residents. It said it has sufficient supplies nearby to feed the population for three months — if deliveries can be expedited.

Distribution, however, remains hampered by looting, breakdowns in law and order, and delays in permits and security clearance from the Israeli military. UNICEF stressed that brief windows to deliver aid do little for children suffering from chronic malnutrition, who need long-term treatment and stability.

On the ground in Gaza, the reaction to Israel’s humanitarian shift has been mostly sceptical. “We received nothing—not from trucks, not from planes,” said a resident of Beit Lahia.

Aid entering through Jordan was reportedly being resold at sky-high prices. Residents report no significant drop in market prices, except for flour, which decreased modestly overnight. A doctor at al-Nasser Hospital said no new medical aid had reached the facility, where the demand for nutritional supplements is critical.

Criticism has also mounted over the airdrops. “They are insulting and dangerous,” said Hikmat al-Masri, an academic from northern Gaza. “They were used early in the war and led to civilian deaths.”

As global condemnation intensified, Israeli officials have blamed the UN for the breakdown in aid delivery. Last week, the IDF released drone footage of aid pallets sitting on the Gaza side of the Kerem Shalom crossing, accusing UN agencies of failure.

The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a US based body that some analysts describe as an Israeli proxy, issued a series of public statements blaming the UN for spoilage, bottlenecks, and inefficiency. One video showed a GHF spokesperson pointing at UN trucks and claiming the food inside was about to go bad.

But Haaretz journalist Nir Hasson called these accusations “groundless”. The UN, he noted, does not control access or movement inside Gaza — the Israeli army does. Every aid convoy, medical mission, and fuel delivery must be approved by the IDF. Permits specify precise routes and timings, with drivers subject to orders from a military app.

Last week alone, the UN made 16 transit requests. Only one was carried out as scheduled. Three others were eventually completed after delays, while the rest were either cancelled or denied.

A key Israeli justification for restricting aid has been the fear that Hamas diverts supplies. But an internal investigation by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) casts doubt on this claim.

According to reporting by Reuters, USAID analysed 156 incidents of theft or loss of US funded humanitarian supplies between October 2023 and May 2024. The investigation found “no reports alleging Hamas” benefited from the aid.

The findings challenge the rationale behind Israel’s restrictions — and also raise questions about the US’s own support for alternative armed aid operations. What the reports and field evidence point to instead is a crisis manufactured not by militant theft but by bureaucratic strangulation and political choices. As critics increasingly note, Israel’s approach appears aimed at controlling the crisis, not resolving it.

For the first time, leading Israeli human rights organisations, B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI), have officially concluded that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, urging international action to halt the atrocities.

In two comprehensive reports released on Monday, the groups argue that Israel’s response to Hamas’ October 7 attack has escalated into a campaign of systematic violence, destruction, and dehumanisation targeting Palestinians in Gaza.

B’Tselem’s report, while unequivocally condemning Hamas’ war crimes, claims Israel’s retaliatory measures, including mass killings, the destruction of infrastructure, widespread displacement, and deliberate starvation, amount to genocide under international law. It points to the use of language by senior Israeli leaders, such as likening Palestinians to "human animals", as evidence of genocidal intent.

The report draws on interviews with Gaza residents, UN data, media investigations, and academic studies. Testimonies detail harrowing experiences, including indiscriminate bombings and mass casualties, with B’Tselem warning of “the largest orphan crisis in modern history”.

PHRI’s legal analysis focuses on the collapse of Gaza’s health system, citing targeted attacks on hospitals, denial of aid, and killings of medical staff. It concludes Israel is violating the Genocide Convention by intentionally creating unliveable conditions.

Both groups demand urgent international intervention, arguing that global institutions have thus far failed to enforce the legal frameworks designed to prevent such crimes. They join a growing list of international organisations and genocide scholars, including Doctors Without Borders and Amnesty International, who assert that Israel’s actions in Gaza meet the legal definition of genocide.

The reports warn that unless global powers act decisively, the destruction of Palestinian society may spread beyond Gaza to the West Bank and within Israel itself.

Israel caused the hunger crisis in Gaza, no matter how much it tries to blame the UN (Nir Hasson, Haaretz)

Israel to implement humanitarian pause in Gaza after international pressure (Axios) 

Israel is pausing operations in some parts of Gaza amid mounting horror over starvation. Will it be enough? (CNN)

Palestinians wary as Israel begins military pauses to allow ‘minimal’ aid into Gaza (The Guardian)

Netanyahu dismissed Gaza's humanitarian disaster. Now, he's scrambling to contain it (Amos Harel, Haaretz)  

USAID analysis found no evidence of massive Hamas theft of Gaza aid (Reuters)

Our genocide (Full report, B’Tselem)

A health analysis of the Gaza Genocide (Full report, Physicians for Human Rights Israel)